Jesus, The Word, and “A Word”

Dr Les Hardin

This is the second post in a series from Dr Les Hardin, the first, “An Open Letter to Christians Who Don’t Read the Bible” can be found here.

First, A Word

I was sitting around reading the Talmud the other day, because I’ve got that kind of time and I’m just that spiritual. Nah. Neither of those things is true (Just ask my dean!). In fact, reading the Talmud makes me think of Luke’s description of the riot in Ephesus: “Most people didn’t even know why they were there” (Acts 19:32).

There’s a
well-known story in tractate Shabbat
about a man asking Rabbi Hillel to teach him the entire Law while standing on
one foot. Hillel responded, “What is
hateful to you, don’t do to others.
That’s the whole Law. The rest is
commentary.” What’s not well-known is the story right before this one, the account of
someone posing a similar question to Rabbi Shammai, who beat him with a stick
for asking it.

These two
stories give us pause for the way we read, understand, and teach the
Bible. Hillel’s approach is the way of
boiling the Law down into a single, palatable nugget, an attempt to help people
understand what the Law was really all about.[1]
Even Jesus summarized all of the commands of the Law in two simple
principles: “Love God and love your
neighbor” (Mark 12:29-31).

But if we’re
not careful, we can reduce the Word of God so drastically that it loses or even
betrays the message. This is seemingly
what Shammai was concerned about. And right now, believers are doing this more
and more. We lift single verses of
Scripture from their context, paint them with stunning backgrounds, and suggest
that the counsel of God is summarized in that single verse. I see it increasingly in what I call “one-word
spirituality,” the practice of divining a message from God from a single word
revealed to a speaker. I once attended
an event in which the speaker said, “When I was thinking about what to preach
tonight, I asked God to give me a word, and the word he wants me to give you is
‘green.’ And that means that God wants
you to grow!” I think to myself, “The word ‘green’ stands
for lots of things. Maybe God wants me
to be jealous. Or naïve. Or carbon-neutral. Or rich!” (Okay, that “green” thing was a bit
facetious. Nobody ever said “green.” I’ve changed the supposedly-given word to
soften the blow a bit.) This kind of
preaching draws from the whims of the human heart, not from the counsel of God,
and I’m not sure I can trust it. After
all, Jeremiah reminds me that there’s nothing in the universe as deceitful as
the human heart (Jer. 17:9).

Perhaps
summarizing the contents of the entire Bible is helpful for someone who doesn’t
know, someone who’s struggling. As a
launching point, a summary is a helpful tool, a lightning rod drawing energy
from surrounding material.

But to
summarize something, you have to know it through and through. And that’s the part of Jesus’ Bible-reading
habits that needs attention.

Jesus and The Word

I discovered this when I was writing a book called The Spirituality of Jesus (Kregel, 2009) and tracking the kinds of texts that Jesus quoted from, alluded to, and parabled. Jesus wasn’t the kind of person who knew certain parts of the Bible. He knew it well. He knew it all. And he knew, not just what it said, but in what direction it was driving.

Coming to
understand how Jesus knew his Bible is fraught with a host of historical
problems, not the least of which is how
he came to know the Scriptures. We’ve
mostly just assumed that because he was divine that he already knew the text
intimately. As one of my recent students
admitted, “I always thought that Jesus would automatically know it. After all, Jesus is God and God is
omniscient.” But the mystery of Jesus
“emptying himself” (Phil. 2:7) to become human means that he didn’t have the
Bible downloaded Matrix-style into
his brain. Luke tells us that he was
continually learning (2:40, 52) and spent a lifetime doing so.

There are
a host of problematic historical questions tied to the issue of how Jesus knew
the Scriptures. Did he learn it at a
school? Or did he learn it at home? Or in the synagogue? When he learned it, did he learn by reading
and writing? Or did he hear it and consider it “read” (like the
way I claim to have read the latest Stephen King novel when I really listened
to it on audio)? These are hard
questions, and if you follow the Cheshire Cat down that hole, the adventures
will be strange and exhilarating.

How Jesus came to know the content of
Scripture is not as important at this moment as the comprehensiveness of Scripture that he knew. When I scour the Gospels looking for evidence
of Jesus’ bible-reading habits, it’s clear that Jesus knew his bible. The breadth
of his knowledge of the OT was incredibly impressive. He knew lots of it, not just a few favored
verses. Certainly more than a word.

When we
peruse the Gospels looking for evidence of Jesus’ interaction with his bible
(not Matthew’s citations proving Jesus’ fulfillment of Scripture, or John’s
allusions to what Jesus meant, but Jesus’ actual quotes) we find some surprising
things. We find him quoting Exodus,
Deuteronomy, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Zechariah, Malachi, Hosea, the Psalms (if judging
by frequency, his favorite book) with further clear allusions to texts from
Genesis, Leviticus, Numbers, 1-2 Kings, Daniel, Ezekiel, Micah, Jonah and 1-2
Chronicles. In one place he’s able to
quickly summarize about fourteen chapters of Genesis with a comprehensive
“Abraham did not do such things” (John 8:40).[2]

Jesus also
knew the difference between the content of
scripture and the popular traditions about
scripture. He knew the difference
between the “traditions of men” and the “commands of God” (Mk. 7:8, Matt. 15:6). Popular traditions (sometimes inferences
about God and life derived from interpreting the commandments) were often
equated with the Law itself, and the two (commandments and traditions) are often
lumped together in the phrase “the Law.”
It’s hard to sort out in places like Galatians and Romans. (And if you don’t believe me, read N. T.
Wright’s Paul and the Faithfulness of
God. It won’t really prove my point,
but it will take you three months to read it and by the time you’re done, you
will have forgotten all about me.)

Here’s my
point: Jesus didn’t have a one-verse or
“one word from God” mentality. Jesus
wanted to know God at the deepest level.
And that only came by knowing the Word of God through and through.

Jesus, The Word

This is
why summaries and “one-word spirituality” makes me edgy. The nugget is usually vague, a word without
context, and is often devoid of any overt connection to the God of Abraham,
Isaac, Jacob, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Jesus, Paul, Peter, and John. It’s not unlike those cheeky Christian
slogans you see floating all over social media (you know, the ones that boil
the faith down to a single, fuzzy platitude):
simple, trite, and devoid of power.
As Paul would say (and yes, I’m about to quote a single verse, and it
will be completely in context with the historical realities and driving force
of the context), “having the appearance of righteousness, but empty of its true
power” (2 Tim. 3:5).

I don’t
want the chicken nuggets—the better parts chopped up, compressed, and given to
me in bite-size portions. What’s more, I
don’t want to be the kind of person who’s content with that—the little bits, un-nutritious,
unfulfilling. I want the whole
meal. I want to be the kind of person
who enjoys taking the time to prepare it, offer it to my family, friends, and
students, and relishes it with them. I
don’t want a single verse from Jeremiah.
I want the whole book, difficult as it is to encounter en toto.

I don’t want “a word” from God. I want all the words from God. And I’ll take all the words from God I can get my hands on.

Dr. Les Hardin

Professor of New Testament

Johnson University Florida

[1] The Babylonian Talmud records it this way: “Six hundred and thirteen commandments were
revealed to Moses … David came and comprehended them in eleven (Ps. 15) …Then
Isaiah came and comprehended them in six (Is. 33:15) … Then Micah came and
comprehended them in three (Mic. 6:8) … Then Isaiah came again, and
comprehended them in two (Is. 56:1).
Finally Amos came and comprehended them in one: Seek me and you shall live (Amos
5:4).” –b.Makkot 24a.

[2] For a detailed analysis of these
citations and allusions, see The
Spirituality of Jesus, pp. 52-70, and the literature cited there.

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Pete Ramsey

Well said Les. I think if I were to take one thought (note – more than a word, less than a paragraph) away as I challenge myself with your thoughts, it would be this: Don’t settle for chicken nuggets when you can have the whole bucket!